MELBOURNE (AFP) — Another attack on an Indian student was reported in Australia on Wednesday as authorities step up efforts to stop the assaults, which have turned a police matter into a diplomatic embarrassment.
Police said a 21-year-old Indian student was confronted on Tuesday evening by five men in the car park of a college campus in the suburbs of the southern city of Melbourne, where many of the attacks have taken place.
They demanded money and cigarettes from the man, then attacked him when he refused to comply, with one slashing him across the chest with a weapon believed to be a box cutter, causing minor lacerations.
Police said the attack was not believed to be racially motivated.
But it is the latest in a wave of assaults on Indian students that media in the South Asian country have dubbed "curry bashings", splashing with headlines such as "Australia, land of racists."
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd called his counterpart Manmohan Singh last month to assure him about student safety in the country amid reports some Indian parents were fearful of sending their children to the country.
Latest available police figures say 1,447 people of Indian origin were robbed or assaulted in Victoria state in 2007-2008, although students from the country say they have risen since then.
Many of the most serious cases occurred in the western suburbs of the state capital Melbourne, where police estimate Indians account for about 30 percent of all robbery and assault victims.
The issue came to a head late last month when student Sravan Kumar Theerthala was left comatose after being stabbed with a screwdriver by gatecrashers at a party.
Since then, the government has called in the former head of Australia's elite Special Air Service (SAS) regiment to lead a task force examining the attacks.
Victoria state has also said it will introduce hate laws so that judges can take account of prejudice against a particular group of people when sentencing for a crime.
Police in Melbourne have also increased patrols on trains and around stations in the city's west.
However, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported the problem was not limited to Melbourne, saying Indian students had experienced similar attacks in Sydney.
"If you come to my college... you'll find a lot of people, like almost like 60 percent of the lot... have been through (attacks) at least once," a 26-year-old Indian student named Sumit told the public broadcaster.
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